<p>Im a junior in high school right now and the guidance counselors are getting GPAs together and whatnot to begin the college search and scholarship search. For probably the last 6 years or so my dream has been to become an aerospace engineer. Upon research, i understand that it is very expensive. </p>
<p>Now being from Massachusetts, i could access some of the greatest schools in the nation. I dont know exact values, but i would venture to say im in the top 10 in my class rank, a weighted gpa of well above 4 and will have taken either 4 or 5 aps by the end of senior year. SATs are unknown since i have spent all SAT season dedicated to my FIRST robotics team (which has produced Carnegie-Mellon, WPI, BU, etc. grads), but my psat results suggest i could be anywhere from 2050-2300.</p>
<p>Obviously, i have looked into stretches like Princeton or MIT, as well as distance stretches like ASU (im a huge baseball fan) or tOSU, RensselaerPI and much of them seem way too far out of budget. My parents make roughly 100,000, pay for 3 kids at home(which includes myself), an older son in the military and paying loans for the oldest who is part time student in her masters program. Also, my parents economic choices arent exactly the smartest so loans will be difficult.</p>
<p>I also have interest in Nuclear Engineering and Mechanical seeing as how Aero is specialized Mech. To cut too the chase, i am wondering if anybody knows of any cheap and yet recognized as impressive aerospace programs?</p>
<p>Texas A&M is pretty cheap, has a 10th-ranked (or so) aerospace program on USNWR, and has a major baseball program to boot. Awesome new stadium too (Google “Blue Bell Park”). That isn’t even homerism, as I just do graduate school here so I have no loyalty to the school like I do for Illinois. It just seems like a potentially excellent fit.</p>
<p>I would strongly advise against ASU. They treat their engineering programs like crap, particularly aerospace. My graduate advisor, an NAE fellow and one of the top experts in te world in my field was at ASU before Texas A&M and left largely on account of the treatment of the engineering school by the university.</p>
<p>Thats interesting. I certainly hadnt decided to pick schools based on their sports programs (although going to schools with big sports doesnt hurt), but A&M’s field is rather remarkable looking and is on the cheaper side of Aero. Im actually disappointed in myself for not finding on my own since its such a well known school hahah. </p>
<p>As for ASU, thats really important info to me. Looking at the school on collegeboard wont tell me what it would be like to study there so its great to hear firsthand stories like that.</p>
<p>Well, I haven’t been there to experience, so it isn’t really firsthand. My advisor just bad mouths them a lot after having worked there for the aforementioned reasons. I know that a lot of stuff he used to use over there, including entire wind tunnels, have been mothballed. We have even been able to take some of the stuff and move it over to TAMU without much fight from ASU. These just seem like red flags to me.</p>
<p>Iowa State University has a top 20 aerospace program. OOS tuition is around $20,000.
Last year they offered my son (3.92 GPA/34 ACT) a nice financial aid package worth $50,000 over four years.</p>
<p>what kind of reputation have you heard about the Syracuse aerospace. I think i love the school, and know i love the Northeast, but i’m not too sure on their program.</p>
<p>I haven’t heard much of anything about the aerospace program at Syracuse, to be honest. I have met Mark Glauser, one of the deans there. He is pretty awesome. My advisor was his advisor many years ago, haha.</p>
<p>USAFA and USNA both offer generous scholarships to qualified applicants, and are well known for their aero programs. It might be too late too apply for their summer seminar programs, though. Caltech might be the #1 aero/astro program in the country, and offers need-based FA. Stanford offers full-tuition scolarships to families making $100K. Embry-Riddle, Georgia Tech, AFROTC, NROTC?</p>
<p>Did you just read Caltech off of the US News rankings? Caltech doesn’t wen have an undergraduate aerospace degree. Not that mechanical is a bad alternative, but it isn’t aerospace.</p>